Hills made deadly by demolition, felling of trees

Looking down from a road that passes a Muslim village near a Hindu temple in Rangamati, one could see homes flattened by landslides.

Mintu Chowdhuryfrom Rangamatibdnews24.com
Published : 18 June 2017, 06:21 PM
Updated : 18 June 2017, 06:21 PM

The area at a 50-foot drop and surrounded by three hills was built out of another hill by levelling it off.

The majority of places destroyed by last week’s landslides seemed to share a common story: the hills there had been razed or cleared of trees.

Six people died in Notun Para whose homes were under a slope carved out of a hill. Three died in the huts that once stood on land cleared under the hills at Post Office Colony.

But razing hills is illegal and the authorities have adopted a tough stance, claimed Masud Karim, regional director of the Environment Department in Chittagong.

But he blamed the devastation on hill demolition.

“Hills are made of sandy soil held together by tree roots. This bonding is lost when water enters the soil, and this leads to landslides,” he said.

The death toll from landslides triggered by heavy rains went over 160 in the five districts of Chittagong, Cox’s Bazar, Khagrachhari, Bandarban and Rangamati, where the casualty was the highest with 115 deaths.

Among the victims were five army soldiers who died while trying to clear a road near their camp at Rangamati’s Manikchhari.

Those living at Rangamati Sadar are mostly migrants from various upazilas who have secured lands illegally or in return for very little money, said Sunil Kanti Dey, a senior journalist living in the remote southeast district for six decades.

Chakma King Devasish Roy disagreed that only hill demolitions contributed to the latest landslides. He blamed it on the unusually heavy rains and unplanned housing.

“There are land crises in towns. So people settle down by razing hills without any form of planning.”

“It usually doesn’t rain this much in Rangamati. We never had landslides like this. The hills without any human settlement have also fallen.”

“Almost all hills cleared of trees have turned to rubble after record rains,” said Rangamati Deputy Commissioner Manzarul Mannan.

Of those killed in Rangamati, 55 are settlers and 60 from small ethnic groups. Of the total deaths, 68 were in Sadar Upazila, with 36 from Vedvedi, an area within the municipality.

There have been landslides in 19 places of Rangamati Sadar, with 10 in Vedvedi alone.

A 2011 census put the population of Rangamati at 620,214. Forty-nine percent of the 124,728 people living in Sadar Upazila came from small ethnic groups.

The population has increased by 271,424 in the ten years to 2011, according to available data, due to an influx of Bangalee settlers taking the figure higher than the national rate.

But they know little about the risk of demolishing hills for their homes. Despite the devastation, clearing work seemed to continue in town areas at Public Health, BADC of Tabalchhari, College Gate and Amanatbagh. Structures were popping up around Kaptai Lake.

But hills make up most of Rangamati, so setting up new homes means they must be razed, according to locals.

There was also no-one to supervise the making of new homes among the hills. The Environment Department was set up in Chittagong with no arms in Rangamati, Khagrachhari or Bandarban.

Officials from Chittagong usually travel to these hill tract districts once something happens.

Journalist Sunil Dey could not recall any action taken by the department over hill demolition in the last ten years.

The district administration did not know what areas were at risk, and claimed it was because the district never experienced such devastation.

“There could have been a list if there was precedence from five to ten years ago. The landslides have shown us the extent of the risk and there’ll be a list now, said Deputy Commissioner Mannan.

According to him, settlers and ethnic locals have been living in “harmony with nature” for decades, but have never known such calamity.